


dreams for two

by 3amscribbles



Category: Emmerdale
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-19
Updated: 2016-07-19
Packaged: 2018-07-25 10:15:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,146
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7528801
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/3amscribbles/pseuds/3amscribbles
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An inside look into Robert’s mind now that the seed of moving in together is planted there.</p>
            </blockquote>





	dreams for two

Summer has become a real thing. It came slowly, tentative as it spread its warmth and made them shed their layers of coats and body warmers. Aaron’s been peeled down to his hoodies, lately. The black one most of the time, as if he knows about the flood of memories that the particular item sends through Robert’s mind of the shaky but forceful climb they’ve gone through. The two of them, together, from defensive remarks and snide sidenotes to gentle teasing with the intent to cause a smile.

Robert’s done a lot of smiling over the past weeks – has figured out how to stretch his lips in the shadow of all the shit he had to watch Aaron go through and found a home in the way his mouth falls open in delight every time Aaron is the first to reach out to connect them. Fingers at the front of his shirts has become a present. Wrinkles in expensive fabric feeling more of a badge of honour than the inconvenience it used to be under manicured nails, because they scream that he’s Aaron’s for the whole village to hear.

The fear lingers. Doesn’t ever go away. He wasn’t good enough when he was a kid. Kept tripping over himself and fucking things up as he went, always with the thought of his dad in his mind – what a disappointment he’d label him if he were still alive. His marriage became a joke, his heart trembled in the face of a man that saw right through him but that still kept looking at him, as if Robert was good despite it all – in the veins beneath spiteful skin and in bones that hasn’t yet been broken. And Robert fucked that up, too. Made them both hurt, got shot, trembled to pieces and worried that his veins were growing bad, too, when Aaron wasn’t looking through them anymore. Filled with transferred blood that wasn’t his own; better than him and changing him from the inside.

He’s been teaching himself about patience. About loving, properly, without expectations and an unspoken plan to get something in return. Sat through tears and snot and the cracking of old wounds in a remarkable heart while his own had a dull thud to it. Delayed fear for the boy Aaron used to be – the one who had to go through hell alone but that still loved better than Robert ever will.

He wonders, still, at night and in the afternoons and sometimes in the face of his lunch, when Aaron can’t eat it with him, if the bravery in that remarkable heart will be satisfied to beat along with the quivers of his own. If the mismatched rhythms will drift apart to form different melodies and leave him aching worse than the gunshot ever did.

The fear is there, in crevices that aren’t in his shirts, but inside his chest. Deep and hidden in nests that the doubts have dug in his bones where they can scratch away at him, undisturbed through finds and losses, and trials and their ever-present lack of proper communication, but mostly in the old shards of the disappointment of never being good enough. Never put first. Never a priority.

Aaron’s soothed him through it all, soft and considerate in a way Robert never got to see back in the day, when the defences were up and Aaron knew to keep a foot in the door just in case. In case _anything_ , everything, always with a hint of disappointment in those breathtaking eyes because letting people down was the one thing Robert felt good at.

The remarkable heart is learning how to spread all that care it holds in an equal matter and Robert’s finding out how to be appreciative of every bit he gets. Finds it easier, now, when he knows what it’s like not to have any of it at all and fears the loss of it.

Fears it all, which is why he’s here, sleep-deprived and too far away from enticing rhythm and sleep-warm skin. The summer’s peeking in curiously through the window, spreading sunbeams over the bare lines of Aaron’s back. Robert hasn’t gotten to trace any of them since yesterday morning, when water was competing with his fingers, trying to run down all that skin in the shower.

Now he’s got hungry fingertips and a lonely volume to his heart because he knows that he’s on the verge of fucking up again, of falling into old habits and leaving Aaron’s face closed off with hurt. Saw it, yesterday, when he stumbled out a promise of thinking about an offer that should have been a clear _yes_.

_Moving in together_. Lining up different rhythms and exposing his own tremble to Aaron’s strength. The very thought of it made the quivers feel even worse, like earthquakes overlapping to get his veins roaring with fear. Fear, fear, fear, that maybe Aaron would look through him and see nothing. The true value of those hollow bones.

“Lie still or get the fuck out of bed,” Aaron grumbles. His voice is thick with sleep; familiar in a way it never could be before, because waking up together was a privilege they rarely had. “Could make me coffee, be a proper boyfriend for once.”

Robert blinks at him, against inquisitive sunlight that seems even brighter now that it’s playing in the aftermath of Aaron’s voice. The rise and fall of his entire torso is like the intro of a favourite song; familiar and exciting all at once as Robert tries to sync with it.

Fails, uneven rhythms and all, but stills when Aaron squeezes grumpy fingers around his thigh. Robert never realized that the quivers were working their way down there, but thinks that it’s fairly fitting that his veins are failing him, finally. Thinks, briefly, that Aaron will feel them crumble through skin and flesh and withdraw his hand in disgust.

But the hand remains, and Robert blurts, “You’re home. My place. That hand.”

Aaron grunts and Robert loves him, even though he makes Robert’s fears feel deathly, because the loss of him would be unbearable.

“I want to get a place, with you, where I can have your hands on me all the time,” Robert manages, careful as he goes. “If you still want to.”

There’s a crack in the rhythm of Aaron’s breathing, of the pulse in the fingertips he’s got pressed to Robert’s skin. A moment where everything stops before it falls into place, synced, beautiful in morning sunlight as Aaron tries to cover up his surprise by grunting, “If you bring me that coffee I might.”

Robert snorts, elated and terrified and in love, and thinks that this is a part of it. Of loving. Of planting bravery in a heart and watching it grow under the attention of the man that loves him back.


End file.
